


the way i see it

by wonderbee (fernic)



Category: The Filthy Frank Show (Web Series)
Genre: M/M, This isn't very romantic, angsty, i guess??, nor is it very happy?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-08
Updated: 2017-01-08
Packaged: 2018-09-15 16:09:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,796
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9243434
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fernic/pseuds/wonderbee
Summary: Thinking logically, loving George shouldn’t be a possibility.





	

**Author's Note:**

> i had something else written that was GOOD and not SHIT like this but i can't fucking find it so until i rewrite it, take this.
> 
> also this is only like 1800 words and like the shortest thing ive written lately so I need to fix that but i guess when writing jojian my idea comes out clearer in many short snippets, so i apologize.

Ian doesn't know why he's here.

Because George is singing, strumming on that banged up ukulele that he got for ten dollars at a damn thrift store, look at him right in the fucking eye, and singing some really shitty song that isn't even shitty, it's amazing, and Ian wants to shove something in his ears so he never has to listen again.

(He’s lying. He wants to listen. He wants to hear George’s voice for the rest of his sorry life, but he also wants so desperately for his heart to stop beating so fast and it _won’t_ , and so this entire thing just needs to stop.)

It's stupid. He was here to listen and help edit some video, not get distracted by George pulling him by the hood of his sweatshirt into his bedroom, pushing him into the bed and sitting on the stool a few feet away with his ukulele on his lap. He should have stopped it the second George started tuning the strings, humming every not until the instrument matched his pitch.

And with every broken note or wrong chord, Ian can feel his heart pulling, and he knows it's wrong, he knows this thing that he feels isn't all that normal (it pulls him down and down and under layers and layers of _whatever_ it is), but he knows that it goes away if he just forces it down, if he just stopped _looking_ at George and how he sings about rain and how someone misses him. Ian can hear himself swallow and he can hear the cheap ukulele already slowly shift out of tune with how hard George is strumming, his eyes finally closed as he hums and he ends the song.

It's hard to describe, everything inside Ian is kind of blurry, moving and still trying to figure everything out, because he knows the song wasn't written for him, he's not someone who puts their cherry stained lips against George's throat or someone who makes him feel enough to write a song, but maybe deep down he wishes he was, and Ian hates that he thinks that's what it is.

George's breath smells like cigarettes and Ian doesn't remember him smoking- he doesn't really remember much right now- his mind too full of the music that George just gave him, how his heart is beating too fast still, how his palms are sweaty and how George is asking him if he's okay, laughing and pushing his hand through Ian's hair before pushing his head back. Ian doesn't fight back and he feels the soft nudge if the wall against the back of his skull. He doesn't feel it.

“Was it good? I kinda put it together a few days ago and finally worked it all out. I need to record it, probably add some effects. Rain, maybe? Not sure yet,” George is saying, tossing the ukulele onto the bed beside Ian. Ian gets up and nods.

“I liked it. You made me feel something, which I think is good,” Ian says, and he forces a laugh, and he can taste something sour in his breath, like everything he's pushing down is coming up as poison and lies and he just wants to never speak again.

“That's good. Anyways, you think you can help me with the video now?” George asks, and Ian follows him out of the bedroom and tries to listen as George tells him about problems he has with his editing software and everything else but why he kept looking at Ian while he sang. Because it's probably nothing, it usually is, but Ian still wants to know, wants to know why his eyes were on him and why they didn't stop staring until he was humming in the end.

The rest of the day is a blur, but Ian's used to it.

|||

“I wanna sing it for you.”

“I don't want to loose my hearing,” Ian says, and he laughs like it's a joke, but he means it. When George sings, his ears stop tuning into the real world. All white noise is gone, and every note is a deep breath in Ian's lungs, every word makes things clearer, for some reason. Ian doesn't know how music works, how it can make bumps rise on your arms and how one song can bring you to tears or make you laugh or make you remember things that you spend so long trying to bury and hide. But that's how it works, no matter how much he tries to make it background noise, it keeps coming up and tugging parts of himself with it.

“Just listen. I wrote it last night,” George says and then he stops moving, turns around and adds, “please?”

And Ian didn't even want to say no before, but now it's impossible to even utter the words.

So he listens, watches as George tunes the ukulele quickly, and strums a few chords, ones that Ian swears he learned before in a middle school music class, but can't remember the name of. They're happy, all major and George is drumming fast, picking some notes to make some kind of melody. It's nice on its own, something Ian could probably fall asleep to, but then George coughs a little, opens his mouth and starts to sing.

And Ian is stuck, stuck in the string of words that leave his friends mouth, stuck in how they go right through him; stuck in how he can practically feel what he is saying. It's wonderful, full of trailed off words and cracked humming and everything that's imperfect, but because it's together and because it's George singing and because it's Ian listening, it's perfect. Because that's how it works with George, really, the nastiest of habits and most disgusting things become pleasurable and bearable. 

They shouldn't. Nothing George does should affect Ian the way it does, but Ian doesn't know how to stop it, so he just does what he's supposed to do. He sits, he listens, and he wishes with his eyes closed.

(Wishes he could feel the words George sings on his lips, wishes he could taste them with his mouth)

When he opens his eyes, George isn't singing anymore, and Ian stops wishing.

|||

Ian has dreams, sometimes.

They’re usually weird, like most dreams are, like the one time where he woke up in a cold sweat because he was in the sewer system with a bunch of rats crawling all over him and trying to get to the pickle jar he had clutched in his arms.

Yeah, weird.

But it get’s weirder, where Ian is waking up with sheets sticking to his skin for no real reason, heart thumping out of his ribs and air stuck behind a wall in his lungs. He doesn’t like to talk about it, when he remembers blissful seconds of dreams that are totally not right, definitely not okay and absolutely not what he wants to be dreaming about. And always, George is left on his mind.

To set things right, they’re not… so bad, he supposes. For example, it’s not like he’s thinking of fucking his best friend, or anything. No, definitely not that, just maybe he thinks he sees glimpses of George’s lips against his shoulder, or maybe the faded figures of bruises down his back, his side, the show of fucking around on set and just being an overall clumsy asshole, to begin with.

Even though the dreams are nice, leave him with this soft, malleable feeling in his chest, he is exhausted. He wants one night where he doesn’t have sheets clinging to him, where he doesn’t wake up breathless. He wants to get over this stupid thing, these stupid feelings, and he doesn’t _care_ if they are not returned, because all they do is make him feel like he’s rotting from the inside out.

|||

Thinking logically, loving George shouldn’t be a possibility. He is insane, unobtainable by people who are too mundane and who can’t handle him. And most people can’t, too many people to count. Ian has done crazy things, has swum in sewer water and basically eaten piss, vomited on his friends and has been vomited on by the same people, but it still doesn’t feel right to love George, because he still seems too far away; he is an idea that Ian cannot yet wrap his head around, cannot get close to.

Even though George is right there, singing, and Ian is looking away, and can’t help these feelings, these stupid thoughts and dreams and can't help it when he leans towards him, shifting his torso and pressing his lips against George’s.

Nothing really happens. George doesn’t jump away or pull back immediately, but he doesn’t press forward either. There isn’t anything special, just Ian kissing George and George just sitting there, strumming one last chord that doesn’t quite end the song, but doesn’t let it continue either. 

Ian pulls away, and George doesn’t punch him in the face.

“That wasn’t supposed to happen like that, or at all,” Ian finally says, and George just nods, presses his lips together and draws them in against his teeth.

“Alright,” comes his answer, and Ian nods, because this is how things happen, he supposes. A mistake occurs and they will jump over it and they will never look back, and Ian will be stuck, watching from inside of himself as he is pulled farther and farther away from a crack in a relationship he is so terrified to hurt.

But he hurt it, and he knows the crack is there, and the dam is filled.

It’s filled, and Ian nods and listens to nothing and feels the tides start to pull. And he knows there is no going back to that moment, no way to push his feelings into George’s chest, despite how bad he wants to. Besides, what good is it, to let himself have what he wants? The bad effects outlast the good, and he knows that he can be satisfied with how things are, he has to, he _must_ -

“Ian,” George says gently, and Ian forces himself back to attention.

“Yeah?”

“It’s alright,” George says, and there’s a hand in his, pulling him a little closer until his lips are ghosting over his cheekbone, right under his eye. Ian feels like he’s falling. “We can figure it out, ‘cause, honestly, I don’t know either.”

And it’s enough of an answer. It is, it _is_.

It is more than enough.

|||

That night, he wakes up, and the sheets are not sticky, and he does not have George’s face or lips or hands or anything on his mind.

Instead, it is cool, relaxing, _relieving_ , and when he closes his eyes, once again he sleeps.

**Author's Note:**

> okay im sorry for this like ugh idek what it is. thank you so so much to the people who commented on my other post, shoutout to the one who said they'd give me "the succ" if i did a continuation of it, i hope this is good enough for ya pal.
> 
> but seriously those comments make my day, and i know this definitely isn;t up to par with Unfortunate Realities but my life is kinda bleh right now, so this is all i can manage.
> 
> I'll write more if I can, though!


End file.
